“I don’t want to hear it.”
Snarling, he walks toward the door. “Fine!”
“And stop trying to manhandle my sister. It’s weird,” I call. When Lainey and Nancy both glare at me, I shrug. “What?”
“You, too, Zeppelin,” Nancy says.
“I can handle myself, Zep. I don’t need you swooping in here acting like a hero,” Lainey says.
Her dark hair and eyes match Johnny’s. It’s hard to look at her sometimes because she reminds me so much of him. A much prettier version, but still him.
I roll my eyes. “He was only trying to cop a feel because I was in here.”
“Out,” Nancy says. “Go.”
Groaning, I shake my head. “Fine. See you tomorrow.”
I walk out to my bike and sigh. Now what am I going to do with the rest of my day?
Chapter Six
Zeppelin
Iget home to find a little girl sitting on the front steps of Gloria’s old house. Normally, I wouldn’t give it a second thought because my neighbor always had people stopping by to talk or get some type of baked good, but Gloria died over a month ago.
I was a pallbearer at her funeral. And I’ve never seen this little girl around town before.
Crossing the street, I stop on the sidewalk to make sure I don’t scare the girl with purple glasses. “Hey, kiddo. Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” she says, adjusting her glasses with the palm of her hand in the cutest gesture I’ve ever seen. “Just waiting for my mom.”
“Your mama’s coming here?”
She nods. “Yep. I think she forgot school got out early today.”
“Do you live… around here?”
Giggling, she sticks out her tongue. “I live here, silly. I don’t have a key yet.”
She lives here? “Who’s your mama?”
“Bernie!” a woman calls from the window of her car as she pulls into the driveway. “I’m so sorry, baby.”
The woman steps out, and I nearly gasp. Thin frame with a plump chest, big, round blue eyes, a button nose, and dark hair that frames her face as it falls from her loose ponytail. She has a curvy ass that I want to reach out and squeeze, but I keep my hands to myself as she walks past me and up the front porch.
She looks too damn young to have a daughter this girl’s age. Which looks to be about eight or nine, I’d guess.
“It’s okay, Mommy. I don’t mind it in the shade.”
The little girl has the same dark hair and eyes as her mama, but she has a completely different style. Thick purple glasses make her look both studious and fun at the same time.
“Why don’t you go inside and get some water? I’ll be right in,” her mom says, handing her a key.
“It was nice meeting you,” Bernie says to me.
“Zeppelin,” I say. “You can call me Zep.”
“Like Led Zeppelin?”
